• Here are the Biggest Nonfiction Bestsellers of the Last 100 Years

    (And the Books We Remember Instead)

    1970

    The best-selling nonfiction of the year:

    1. David Reuben, Everything You Always Wanted To Know About Sex but Were Afraid To Ask
    2. The New English Bible
    3. “J” (Joan Garrity), The Sensuous Woman
    4. Better Homes and Gardens Fondue and Tabletop Cooking
    5. Robert Townsend, Up the Organization
    6. Jim Bouton, Ball Four
    7. William Morris, American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language
    8. Julius Fast, Body Language
    9. Rod McKuen, In Someone’s Shadow
    10. Rod McKuen, Caught in the Quiet

    Also published that year:

    Richard Nelson Bolles, What Color is Your Parachute?
    Germaine Greer, The Female Eunuch
    Kate Millet, Sexual Politics

    1971

    The best-selling nonfiction of the year:

    1. “M” (Joan Garrity, John Garrity, and Len Forman), The Sensuous Man
    2. Dee Brown, Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee
    3. Better Homes and Gardens Blender Cook Book
    4. Thomas Harris, I’m O.K., You’re O.K.
    5. David Reuben, Any Woman Can!
    6. Albert Speer, Inside the Third Reich
    7. Joseph P. Lash, Eleanor and Franklin
    8. Lawrence Welk, Wunnerful, Wunnerful!
    9. Gay Talese, Honor Thy Father
    10. Rod McKuen, Fields of Wonder

    Also published that year:

    Jane Goodall, In the Shadow of Man
    John Rawls, A Theory of Justice
    Boston Women’s Health Book Collective, Our Bodies, Ourselves

    1972

    The best-selling nonfiction of the year:

    1. Kenneth Taylor, The Living Bible
    2. Thomas Harris, I’m O.K., You’re O.K.
    3. Nena and George O’Neill, Open Marriage
    4. Margaret Truman, Harry S. Truman
    5. Robert C. Atkins, Dr. Atkins’ Diet Revolution
    6. Better Homes and Gardens Menu Cook Book
    7. Laurence J. Peter, The Peter Prescription
    8. Ruth Montgomery, A World Beyond
    9. Carlos Castaneda, Journey to Ixtlan
    10. Better Homes and Gardens Low-Calorie Desserts

    Also published that year:

    John Berger, Ways of Seeing
    Alex Comfort, The Joy of Sex

    1973

    The best-selling nonfiction of the year:

    1. Kenneth Taylor, The Living Bible
    2. Robert C. Atkins, Dr. Atkins’ Diet Revolution
    3. Thomas Harris, I’m O.K., You’re O.K.
    4. Alex Comfort, The Joy of Sex
    5. Jean Nidetch, Weight Watchers Program Cookbook
    6. Mildred Newman et al., How To Be Your Own Best Friend
    7. Christopher Finch, The Art of Walt Disney
    8. Better Homes and Gardens Home Canning Cookbook
    9. Alistair Cooke, Alistair Cooke’s America
    10. Flora R. Schreiber, Sybil

    Also published that year:

    Harold Bloom, The Anxiety of Influence
    Oliver Sacks, Awakenings

    1974

    The best-selling nonfiction of the year:

    1. Marabel Morgan, The Total Woman
    2. Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward, All the President’s Men
    3. Merle Miller, Plain Speaking: An Oral Biography of Harry S. Truman
    4. Alex Comfort, More Joy: A Lovemaking Companion to The Joy of Sex
    5. Alistair Cooke, Alistair Cooke’s America
    6. Carlos A. Castaneda, Tales of Power
    7. Harry Browne, You Can Profit from a Monetary Crisis
    8. James Herriot, All Things Bright and Beautiful
    9. Charles Berlitz with J. Manson Valentine, The Bermuda Triangle
    10. Harry Lorayne and Jerry Lucas, The Memory Book

    Also published that year:

    Vincent Bugliosi, Helter Skelter
    Robert A. Caro, The Power Broker
    Annie Dillard, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek
    Robert Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance
    Studs Terkel, Working
    Lewis Thomas, The Lives of a Cell

    1975

    The best-selling nonfiction of the year:

    1. Billy Graham, Angels: God’s Secret Agents
    2. Robert Ringer, Winning Through Intimidation
    3. Harold H. Bloomfield, TM: Discovering Energy and Overcoming Stress
    4. Jacob Bronowski, The Ascent of Man
    5. Sylvia Porter, Sylvia Porter’s Money Book
    6. Laurence E. Morehouse and Leonard Gross, Total Fitness in 30 Minutes a Week
    7. Charles Berlitz with J. Manson Valentine, The Bermuda Triangle
    8. David Reuben, The Save-Your-Life Diet
    9. David Niven, Bring on the Empty Horses
    10. Theodore H. White, Breach of Faith: The Fall of Richard Nixon

    Also published that year:

    Paul Fussell, The Great War and Modern Memory
    Philip Roth, Reading Myself and Others
    Paul Theroux, The Great Railway Bazaar

    1976

    The best-selling nonfiction of the year:

    1. Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, The Final Days
    2. Alex Haley, Roots
    3. Dr. Wayne W. Dyer, Your Erroneous Zones
    4. Gail Sheehy, Passages: The Predictable Crises of Adult Life
    5. Charles W. Colson, Born Again
    6. Erma Bombeck, The Grass ls Always Greener over the Septic Tank
    7. Billy Graham, Angels: God’s Secret Agents
    8. John Dean, Blind Ambition: The White House Years
    9. Shere Hite, The Hite Report: A Nationwide Study of Female Sexuality
    10. Leon Jaworski, The Right and the Power: The Prosecution of Watergate

    Also published that year:

    Bruno Bettelheim, The Uses of Enchantment
    Richard Dawkins, The Selfish Gene
    Maxine Hong Kingston, The Woman Warrior

    1977

    The best-selling nonfiction of the year:

    1. Alex Haley, Roots
    2. Robert Ringer, Looking Out for #1
    3. James Herriot, All Things Wise and Wonderful
    4. Dr. Wayne W. Dyer, Your Erroneous Zones
    5. David Wallechinsky, Irving Wallace, and Amy Wallace, The Book of Lists
    6. Charles Paul Conn, The Possible Dream: A Candid Look at Amway
    7. Carl Sagan, The Dragons of Eden
    8. Carlos Castaneda, The Second Ring of Power
    9. Erma Bombeck, The Grass ls Always Greener over the Septic Tank
    10. Jay Anson, The Amityville Horror

    Also published that year:

    Michael Herr, Dispatches
    Susan Sontag, On Photography

    1978

    The best-selling nonfiction of the year:

    1. Erma Bombeck, If Life Is a Bowl of Cherries, What Am I Doing in the Pits?
    2. Wil Huygen and Rien Poortvliet, Gnomes
    3. James Fixx, The Complete Book of Running
    4. Christina Crawford, Mommie Dearest
    5. Dr. Wayne W. Dyer, Pulling Your Own Strings
    8. Richard Nixon, RN: The Memoirs of Richard Nixon
    7. Barbara Tuchman, A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous Fourteenth Century
    8. Brian Froud and Alan Lee, Faeries
    9. Theodore H. White, ln Search of History: A Personal Adventure
    10. The Muppet People, The Muppet Show Book

    Also published that year:

    Edward Said, Orientalism

    1979

    The best-selling nonfiction of the year:

    1. Erma Bombeck, Aunt Erma’s Cope Book
    2. Herman Tarnower and Samm Sinclair Baker, The Complete Scarsdale Medical Diet
    3. Howard J. Ruff, How to Prosper During the Coming Bad Years
    4. Steve Martin, Cruel Shoes
    5. Nathan Pritikin and Patrick McGrady Jr., The Pritikin Program for Diet and Exercise
    6. Henry Kissinger, White House Years
    7. Lauren Bacall, Lauren Bacall By Myself
    8. Bob Woodward and Scott Armstrong, The Brethren: Inside the Supreme Court
    9. Robert J. Ringer, Restoring the American Dream
    10. Charles Paul Conn, The Winner’s Circle

    Also published that year:

    Joan Didion, The White Album
    Sandra Gilbert and Susan Gubar, The Madwoman in the Attic: The Woman Writer and the Nineteenth-Century Literary Imagination
    Douglas Hofstadter, Godel, Escher, Bach
    Norman Mailer, The Executioner’s Song
    Edward O. Wilson, On Human Nature
    Tom Wolfe, The Right Stuff
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    Emily Temple
    Emily Temple
    Emily Temple is the managing editor at Lit Hub. Her first novel, The Lightness, was published by William Morrow/HarperCollins in June 2020. You can buy it here.
    https://www.emilytemple.net/





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